


Promise

by helloopepper



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel (Movies)
Genre: Drabble, F/M, a sad thing, but not really, i did a thing, sorry bout it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-14
Updated: 2013-04-14
Packaged: 2017-12-08 11:06:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 525
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/760635
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/helloopepper/pseuds/helloopepper
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Because he'd made a promise. One that he intended to keep.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Promise

**Author's Note:**

> So I wrote this for an RP that I'm a part of (I play Tony, le duh~) and idk I liked how it turned out so I decided to post it here. Inspired by a post I found on tumblr and would link, but have since lost.

It was actually extremely uncomfortable. In fact, it was verging on painful. It was a large metal device wired into the middle of his chest, why wouldn’t it be?

He never complained.

The arc reactor would press against his trachea every time he took a deep breath, making him feel like he was choking. Coughing was so painful it made his eyes water. He thought every sneeze would be his last.

He never complained.

When he would come back from missions, Pepper would run at him, gripping him in a vice-like hug in a way that made him think she would never let go. Her chest crushed into his, the reactor pressing deep into his vitals. He would gasp quietly at the pain as she held him close and whispered into his chest.

He never complained.

The nerve endings in his skin never fully reconnected after healing around the arc reactor. He would sometimes run his fingers over the area absentmindedly, lightly scratching blunt nails across his chest to see if he could feel anything. He never could. It unnerved him, deep down, to have part of his own body feel so foreign; like it wasn’t even him.

He never complained.

Every blow he took to the chest made him sure he was one step closer to death. It was always the same: a blinding white stab of pain as the reactor would crush deep into his heart (or what was left of it) and his windpipe. Sometimes he was even sure he could feel it all the way to his spine. It was the kind of pain that would echo in the back of his mind long after it had diminished, making him flinch away subconsciously whenever someone got too close.

He never complained.

Sometimes he would drink to numb the pain. Actually, he drank for a lot of reasons, but sometimes that was why. On days when the piece of machinery in his chest felt particularly heavy, the uncomfortable pressure on his windpipe making every breath shallow. Those days seemed to coincide with days when his thoughts were filled with past mistakes and self-loathing. The two things might’ve been related. He didn’t look into it. Instead he drank himself blind, stumbling around his workshop and generally making a mess of things until Pepper put him to bed with a sigh and a sad smile as he attempted to slur out a drunken apology.

It was as he was drifting off to sleep, in those last few moments of consciousness when you can’t control the thoughts that fill your head, when he remembered. Always the same moment, as clear in his mind as the day it happened. The man who saved his life dying in front of him, and he not being able to do anything about it. _“Don’t waste it...don’t waste your life Stark.”_ Yinsen’s last words echo through his mind. A reminder. A promise.

And so Tony ignored the pain and discomfort in his chest. Didn’t wince when Pepper held him. Tried not to flinch when Barton jokingly punched him. Because he’d made a promise. One that he intended to keep.


End file.
